I’m not claiming that I know anything more than anyone else but I will say that I have seen almost every kind of assumptive disposition a person can take about it. So it is with war­ranted ire that I say people can be misguided fools about the notion of virginity, especially in later years.

Right around the time men stop running away from girls and start running towards them instead, both sides begin to gain preconceived notions on what virginity implies and the goals contingent to eventually losing it.

Circumventing what is a good or bad view of virginity because people get too riled up about it, I look more towards the stereotypes and the reasons why and when each person loses it.

Stereotypically speaking, women are thought to lose their virginity for the sake of love and devotion while men lose it to seem macho and because they simply cannot suppress their libido. Suffice it to say that not only are these are wrong implications, it is also a false dichotomy. There be a reversal of genders in each role and there are more than just two reasons. This improper duality has brought negative perceptions into the minds of others.

One of the major culprits for these percep­tions is the double standard. Men are praised at how quickly they can lose it. Women, usually being placed with the opposite, instead have a window of when they receive the least amount of judgement. Too early and you are a slut; too late and you’re thought to be the crazy-cat-lady-sometimes-prudish-spinster type.

Although I know a good portion of people would disagree that they think like this, for some of them the underlying bias is there along with the rest of the people who believe the standard to be true.

To those who blatantly judge people for virgins and to those who judge them quietly, I am telling you to change your incorrect outlook. Having had sex or not doesn’t matter; why you wanted/want to do it and why you did/haven’t done it yet and the level of corroboration these to aspects have are what matter.

The physical act of sex itself does not change a person. How you feel, what the actions you took to get to there, and your reasons before, during, and after sex are what make a person different.

So if someone wants to lose their virgin­ity because they want to have sex for the visceral and physical pleasure, let them. If they want to wait for the right person, or wait for marriage (something I don’t see much of a reason for), then let them. Likewise, when you accept their decision, don’t place inane prejudices on them.

On a related note, waiting for sex should not be scoffed at. I know we all have certain “rules” and “dates” as to when it should happen and some can seem too short and others too long. In the end it doesn’t make you a better or a worse person. What really matters is that you do it when you want to, not when somebody else does or when other people tell you to.

With all that being said, the judges and juries that place these tiring sentences on people who have no reason to be convicted need to stop. Similarly, any virgin who gets persecuted needs only to be told that you don’t have to listen to them. Have sex when you want and fuck everybody else.

On sex’s behalf though, I will say it is pretty spectacular. Super fantastic even.

Sheila Ball found her placement in Peru to be valuable; however, she had concerns with the lack of communication from INDEV administration. Courtesy Sheila Ball

This spring, students graduating from International Development (INDEV) will be the first in their program to convocate. The INDEV class of 2012 has recently returned to Waterloo from their eight-month field placements, which were developed to replace their final year of classes.

The INDEV program is a unique hybrid of academics and field work, which allows students to apply their knowledge during a placement in countries such as Vietnam, Peru, and Malawi.

Though it isn’t a standard co-op program (students must choose from a short list of approved placements and don’t get paid), its structure is reflective of Waterloo’s focus on cooperative education.

Sheila, who did part of her field placement at the Ministry of Environment in Peru, was generally satisfied with the placement. “I’m gaining experience that I can put on my resume that’s directly applicable to the types of jobs that I’m applying for. [...] The experience I’m gaining has definitely been very valuable,” said Sheila.

INDEV students are a tight-knit group. Most of them spent their first year together at St. Paul’s University College, and with a class size of 23, it’s not hard to get to know everyone. But some students have found that being guinea pigs in a new program has its downsides as well.

While the practical experience is valu­able, being plucked out of Canadian society to work in a foreign country for eight months has its mental and physical challenges.

Culture shock and homesickness are par for the course, but there are also more pressing risks. Multiple students contracted malaria during their field placements, and two others had to return home before April due to physical and mental health concerns.

There is no “regular” stream of INDEV. There is no opportunity to take a year of classes at UW if you cannot complete the field placement. The eight-month intern­ship is a required portion of the program, and those who have had to leave because of extenuating circumstances were left in limbo, unsure of whether they’d be able to graduate.

The two-term field placement is worth three credits and is treated the same as any other course. And as with any course, if you don’t complete the work, you can’t get a passing grade.

Allison is one INDEV student that came face-to-face with this inflexibility in the INDEV administration.

During her time overseas, she lost two grandparents, contracted giardia and an amoebic parasite which caused a vitamin deficiency, and suffered from severe de­pression. She contacted INDEV staff to ask about alternate arrangements for completing her degree from Waterloo. The initial response advised her to continue with the placement in Vietnam, or transfer to another program.

“It felt like they were telling me, ‘If you can’t survive this, you shouldn’t work in the field,’” said Allison. After six weeks of further discussion, INDEV staff urged her to come home on account of her pressing health concerns. But, four months away from graduation, they would not provide her with an alternate way to complete the degree requirements. This question was left hanging, and only added to Allison’s burden.

“I find myself very frustrated that this program does not have the structure to sup­port students like myself suffering through personal problems while in the field and struggling to continue,” said Allison.

UW Counselling Services is available to all Waterloo students, but INDEV staff was seemingly unaware of these services. Allison was eventually connected with a counsellor, after making her own inquiries and going outside of the INDEV staff hierarchy to find support.

World University Services of Canada, or WUSC, is the third-party organisation tasked with managing INDEV’s field placements. It runs several of its own volunteer programs around the world, including Students With­out Borders and Uniterra.

Under the Uniterra program, students of all disciplines can volunteer for two or more months at a time. For these place­ments, WUSC pays for the volunteers’ airfare, insurance, and basic living ex­penses. INDEV students were subjected to a decidedly different deal. On top of tuition, students were required to pay a $3,000 administration fee, as well as airfare and living expenses.

Despite the differences in administration costs, Uniterra volunteers and INDEV students often found little difference in their duties on the ground — indeed, many had identical job descriptions as Uniterra volunteers that were working for the same agencies.

The relationship between IN­DEV students and WUSC has been a tenuous one. Before their field placements, the students were forced to sign a contract with WUSC that some of them didn’t agree to — the wording of the agreement would have made all coursework com­pleted by the students the property of WUSC. WUSC claimed that it would amend the contract, but only after students had signed off on the original wording.

International development is an inherently volatile field, and many of the students graduating this spring had to switch jobs partway through the placement term.

The reasons varied, from funding for their position being cut, to entire organisations going belly-up, to po­sitions bearing little resemblance to what the students had signed up for.

In most cases, suitable alternatives were found. But the administration did not appear to have contingency plans for dealing with unforeseen circumstances.

In the pre-departure discussions with INDEV administrators, students asked repeatedly what recourse they would have in the case of accidental injury or sickness.

In response, the administration advised them to not get sick. The substantive issues of mental health, sickness, and injury were largely swept under the rug during these briefings. Students were told that issues of mental health, sickness, and injury would be dealt with on a case-by-case basis, leaving them without a clear idea of how problems in the field would be handled.

Dr. Larry Swatuk, the INDEV Program Director, had the following to say about students who are unable to complete their field placement due to unforeseen circumstances.

“Anyone who has been on a long-term field placement in a developing country knows that there is no easy substitute for field experience. It is a unique and life-changing exercise,” said Swatuk. “So the primary inten­tion of the program is that once a student is deemed healthy, he or she must complete the field placement.”

While INDEV field placements are managed by WUSC, 1,400 interna­tional co-op placements are managed every year by Co-operative Education and Career Action (CECA). CECA handles the administration of co-op work terms in every other program, but is conspicuously absent from INDEV.

Before embarking on an inter­national co-op term, students in other programs must undergo a pre-departure orientation, giving them information about what to do in the case of illness, injury, or mental health issues when working abroad.

“Counselling Services are available to students who are on work terms and we made referrals to them as the need arises,” said Olaf Naese, a com­munications and marketing adminis­trator for CECA. “They have offered tremendous support and coaching to us as well as to our students.”

Rather than borrowing from CECA’s experience with risk manage­ment, INDEV established a separate agreement in partnership with WUSC, which has proven to be inadequate in some cases.

“It’s very clear that no one in INDEV knows how to handle depres­sion,” Allison said. “The process was so slow that I think they were just trying to stretch it out in hopes that I would get over it.”

In addition to the on-the-ground development work, students were required to submit a number of as­signments to the program’s director. Many never received evaluations of their work, nor fully understood what was required of them.

“You’re on the right track, keep up what you’re doing,’ was the only feedback I ever got,” lamented Sheila. “I then submitted my term paper and got a final grade. [...] We’re far away. What’s really important? Communication. What’s lacking? Communication.”

Most students were satisfied with their field placements on the whole, and spoke highly of the local WUSC offices which helped them with ad­ministrative tasks, translation, and managing minor medical concerns. The frustration for many of the stu­dents is directed at a lack of leadership and transparency from the INDEV staff in Waterloo.

“In our program we emphasise that the glass is half-full, and that through the careful combination of theory and practice, our students will emerge from the program with the capacity to help make meaningful, positive change in the world now,” said Dr. Swatuk.

Based on the experiences of students, such as Sheila and Allison, it appears that the administrative structure of the INDEV program must be refined if all students are to reach that ideal.

Canadians remember the devastating impact on many families from deaths caused by the Listeriosis outbreaks. We know that more needs to be done to protect consumers, but in a callous and misguided move the Conservatives are making the problem worse. They have decided to cut food inspectors and eliminate programs designed to proactively identify unsafe meat and other food products.

Bowing to industry pressure, Conservatives are also eliminating enforcement of product labelling in spite of widespread violations. Consumers will now be responsible for determining whether companies’ claims about nutritional information, such as levels of cholesterol, sodium and sugar, are true. For those with serious health conditions like peanut allergies or diabetes, false claims could prove deadly.

Waiting for Canadians to get sick is not a food safety strategy.

Liberals are opposing these cuts because Canadians deserve to know that food they buy at the grocery store is safe and that manufacturers’ health claims are true. I encourage Mr. Braid to reverse his reckless position and put Canadians’ health first.

Frank Valeriote, MP

Liberal Party Critic for Agriculture

To look at this question, we must return to the very purpose of the higher education sector. Colleges and Universities exist to teach, to research, and to serve the communities in which they live, and society writ large. This service to our country is both noble and essential to our ongoing prosperity.

Using an economic lens, I see the functions of our higher education sec­tor — colleges and universities — as labour force development; research, essential to our long-term prosper­ity; and, service. Increasingly, service means the support of commercializa­tion of pure and applied research, the formation of close partnerships with industry, and the promotion of entrepreneurship that, presumably, will be the source of new jobs for all these fee-paying students.

Certainly, one could argue the value of our higher education institutions are much more than the sums of the three above mentioned parts, as these institutions contribute immeasurable value to the shaping of meaning and culture in our modern world. How­ever, in an economic view, economics is dominated by what we can measure, often along a balance sheet.

Universities are highly accountable to their masters in education minis­tries of education. I recall a period when the University of Waterloo undertook to devise new account­ability measures and quality metrics. The statistics, including the number of graduates, the number of research articles, patents, and even university spin-off enterprises and new start-ups , were published and reported as quality metrics, the verifiable outputs of our costly system.

Are we really measuring all the right things? How do our universi­ties or colleges measure fairness to students? How do they address the growing costs (adjusting for infla­tion)? The question on the minds of many students (and their parents), “are we getting value for money?” They don’t have that answer, but they could; and, easily.

It has been said before by many academics that we ought to sepa­rate the accounting of our higher education institutions’ three distinct missions of teaching, research, and service. Do our senates and boards carry out this analysis? Peer-reviewed publications already address the ac­counting question and outline a model of best practice.

Sustainable management of a col­lege or university is to consider the needs of industry, of government, and of the community in which they serve. This model implicitly states that these higher education institutions include the interests of NGOs and community groups.

Perhaps, it is time colleges and universities take heed, and listen to the real and growing concerns over value for money, and do so by showing that what is invested for teaching is spent for teaching; and, likewise for research, and for service.

Governments can benefit from such an accounting as they can obtain detailed information about the relative productivity of a school producing an arts graduate, or an engineer. This would be key to improving economic outcomes as governments already encourage specialization amongst universities in the pursuit of excel­lence in a global arena, but it would require governments to identify how much of their funding is intended for teaching, research, or service.

Schools, too, can benefit from this approach.

Recruitment is a competitive field. Undergraduate recruitment officers travel to high schools vying for top graduates, while parents peruse Ma­clean’s to determine the best school for their child. Cost accounting would yield a new measure of program competitiveness. “Why go to that school, when for the same cost to you, our school would return more resources towards your education than that one,” recruitment officers could argue.

Finally, policy makers can celebrate this new accountability measure because they will have new data to compare productivity with quality between university institutions. This sort of information can offer insight and encourage innovation in our higher education sector. Innovationis the key factor to improved productiv­ity, an area where Canada greatly lags compared to our closest neighbor and competitor south of the border.

Ask your senators and board members what they think their re­sponsibility is to their community, and if they think they should ask their institutional leaders for a new quality metric and account for the inputs and outputs of our higher education institutions.

It is a matter of ethics, of ac­countability and of productivity. In the words of Joseph Stiglitz, Nobel prize-winning economist, “If you don’t measure the right thing, you don’t do the right thing.”

John Andersen
Former Feds President, University of Waterloo

Comic by Winona So

Conservative MPP Elizabeth Witmer resigned from her post after being offered the top position at the Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB). Premier Dalton McGuinty appointed Witmer as the chair of the WSIB, which is responsible for admin­istering the Workplace Safety and Insurance Act. Witmer gets a pay raise from an MPP’s $116,550 base salary to a very comfortable $188,000 per year as chair of this organization.

Congratulations to Witmer, a 22-year veteran of the Ontario Legislature, she deserved the post. You can’t stay in politics forever, and nobody should expect her to. She has served her community for 22 years as MPP, acting as Deputy Premier and holding senior cabinet positions in labour, health, and education during that time; she also served for a decade as a school board trustee. She has the expertise and I’m sure she will thrive in the position.

The opposition parties are speculating that Mc­Guinty had ulterior motives, claiming that perhaps the Premier choose the candidate based on politics and not proficiency.

“Did the premier appoint Miss Witmer based on her vision for the WSIB, or are they so desper­ate for a majority government they’re ready to play politics with this appointment?” New Democrat Taras Natyshak asked during the legislature’s ques­tion period.

The claims have some basis, after all, the Liber­als fell one seat short, holding just 53 seats of the 107, while 54 seats are needed for the majority. However, Dalton’s motives may not be so sinister.

First of all, there is no guarantee that McGuinty will regain the seat. The Liberals have been creeping up on Witmer for the past few elections. Though the Liberals lost the riding by 3,519 (7.16 per cent) last October, they have; however, the riding is not very politically motivated.

For 45 years, since the Toronto Maple Leafs won their last Stanley Cup, only three people have represented Waterloo, with each serving at least 10 years.

The voters in this riding rarely go with flow, supporting more opposition parties than those who created the government. During those 45 years, there were 13 legislatures and the representative has served with the ruling party for only four of them — approximately 30 per cent of the time. That might change once again if Liberal candidate Eric Davis, who lost with 36.25 per cent of the votes, can increase his share of the vote in the upcoming by-election.

This riding was more Witmer’s than the Conservatives, and the riding will once again determine who will represent them based on their values and beliefs more than their political affiliations.

Davis seems like a promising successor to Wit­mer’s seat, considering his value in the community. Davis was named by the Waterloo Region Record as one of the Region’s Top 40 Under 40, this past year, as he has been very active in the community. But until the other parties release their respective candidates, it’s too tough to tell which party will have the upper hand.

The second point of contention is that even if the Liberals win the seat, they will not have a true majority. There may be 107 seats in the Ontario Legislature, but one of them isn’t exactly partisan. The Speaker of the Legislature only votes in the occasion of a tie and then must vote by precedent, as their job is more to enable debate than enact law. Although Dave Levac was elected as a Liberal, he won’t always be voting in favour of legislation if it means that his vote will be the tie-breaker.

“The Speaker will always vote in favour of a bill at first and second reading, to continue debate. But when it gets to third reading the Speaker will vote against any bill by precedent,” former speaker Chris Stockwell told Steve Paikin of The Agenda. “The Speaker will never make laws, so he will vote nay.”

The Liberals will still need the help of other parties in order pass legislation, but that is good news for us. This set of circumstances will ease the burden for voters in our riding. We don’t have to focus on the politics and can just choose the best candidate to represent our values.

Sallie Ann Keller has left her post as director of the Institute for Defense Analyses Science and Technology Policy Institute in Washington D.C. to become the new provost and vice-president academic of the University of Waterloo.

While the president is generally the figurehead of the institution, provid­ing direction and representing the university at various public functions, the provost is the one who deals with the more day-to-day operations.

Geoff McBoyle, a distinguished teacher award recipient from his time as a physical geography professor, has been filling the position on an interim basis and will be returning to his position as associate vice-president academic.

Photos Courtesy Waterloo Image Gallery

Chris Read, the former University Housing Officer has now assumed his role as associate provost, students. He will be responsible for overseeing the Student Success Office, Athletics, Retail Services, Food Services, Hous­ing and Residences and other aspects of the university that directly impacts students. Read takes over from Bud Walker who was recently named spe­cial advisor to the provost.

After former vice-president exter­nal relations Meg Beckel, commonly known to students as the person in charge of releasing public statements regarding the laser logo fiasco three years ago, left to head the Canadian Museum of Nature, it was decided that her role would be split into two.

The first of the successor positions is vice-president university relations. Tim Jackson, a former Feds executive and current CEO of the Accelerator Centre will be responsible for advanc­ing the university’s goals by ensuring strong external relationships locally, nationally and internationally.

“The university has numerous stakeholders — students, staff, fac­ulty, government, donors, employers, research partners, etc — we need to ensure we are telling our story in a consistent meaningful way to these parties — that is job one,” said the new vice-president.

The second position, responsible for advancing the university’s goals through strategic fundraising and alumni relations programs, locally, nationally and internationally, is titled vice-president advancement.

Alumni donations are crucial for an academic institution’s continued growth and to fill this position the university has recruited an individual from California’s oldest private re­search university — the University of Southern California in Los Angeles.

As vice provost at USC, Kenneth McGillivray has played a major role in increasing USC’s impact and vis­ibility abroad, overseeing the Office of Globalization and USC’s eight international offices located in Asia and the Americas. He also provides leadership for USC’s global strategic plan, including international advance­ment and alumni relations.

“I am absolutely delighted to be joining the University of Waterloo and I look forward to working with colleagues, students and the commu­nity at large to advance the academic, research and service goals of this great institution,” said McGillivray.

It is no secret that the University of Waterloo is working hard to not only further its reputation internationally but also connect with overseas alumni. Last November the university opened an office in Hong Kong.

The creation of the vice-president advancement position and hiring of McGillivray, who is experienced in overseeing international offices with undoubtedly prove valuable on the university’s quest to become a top 100 ranked school. McGillivray becomes a member of the university’s senior team August 1st.

Courtesy Waterloo Image Gallery

The Honourable Kevin G. Lynch has been appointed chair of the University of Waterloo Board of Governors.

“The University of Waterloo is a great Canadian university with the potential to be a world leader in driving innovation through our students, our research and our collaborations,” said Lynch. “It is a real honour and privilege to chair the Board of Governors, which is very dedicated to Waterloo and all it stands for, and have the wonderful opportunity to work with Feridun and his team, the excellent faculty, the com­mitted staff, the outstanding students and our alumni.”

The former executive director for Canada at the International Monetary Fund is the currently the vice-chair of BMO Financial Group and holds board positions on multiple groups including the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics

Lynch’s distinguished career with the Government of Canada includes serving as Deputy Minister of both departments of Finance and Indus­try before becoming Clerk of the Privy Council in 2006 and thus Head of the Public Service of Canada until to his retirement in 2009.

The chair of the Board of Gover­nors has the responsibility of provid­ing effective leadership and fulfills this responsibility through a number of means, including ensuring the board can function independently of management, establishing procedures to govern the board’s work, serving as advisor to the president, and ensuring appropriate committee structures and membership.

The School’s governance struc­ture is such that the Centre for International Governance Innova­tion (CIGI), founded and chaired by Jim Balsillie, has veto power over approving programs, deciding the research direction of the school, and budget decisions, among other powers.

“These features of the agreement directly contradict the principles of academic autonomy and integrity,” claimed James L. Turk, CAUT’s execu­tive director. The association has given both universities until November to give BSIA more control over its own affairs, or academic censure will be imposed. Censure would discourage academics from accepting positions at UW and WLU or visiting the campuses.

The press release from UW and WLU state that both universities are “firmly committed to protect­ing academic freedom” and that “the allegations that prompted this recommendation have no basis in fact.” Both universities assert that the current governing document of the BSIA adequately protects the school from third-party influence.

CIGI’s executive director, Thomas A. Bernes, also voiced opposition to CAUT’s intent to censure. “CIGI is confident that academic freedom at the BSIA will continue to be protected with the utmost rigor. A recently passed governance document reaf­firms the integrity of the partnership and a commitment to teaching and research of the highest standard.”

These statements have not appeased CAUT, which remains concerned that CIGI’s influence in the governance structure will sacrifice academic integrity in the pursuit of economic interests.

President Feridun Hamdullahpur and Chancellor of Nanjing University, Yinxing Hong, signed an agreement that renews the Sino- Canadian College in Nanjing for another five years. Courtesy Waterloo Image Gallery

A delegation from Nan­jing University in Chi­na, led by Chancellor Yinxing Hong, was on campus April 12th to review the ac­complishments of the Sino- Canadian College and sign a new agreement renewing the collaborative initiative with the University of Waterloo.

“We are honoured to work so closely with Nanjing Uni­versity on this initiative,” said Hamdullahpur. “Such important collaborations enable us to bring a diversity of research and aca­demic experience to our faculty, international expertise to our campus, and opportunities for students to receive an international education.”

The first Nanjing students started the 2+2 joint undergraduate degree program in September of 2006. Stu­dents completing the program earn degrees from both schools.

Hamdullahpur represented Ca­nadian universities at the presti­gious International Exhibition & Conference on Higher Education in Riyadh, speaking of ways in which institutions can prepare graduates to be productive in an ever-changing world, on April 18th.

While in Riyadh, Hamdullahpur renewed and expanded the University of Waterloo’s co-operation with King Saud University as the president and Abdullah A. Al-Othman, university rector at King Saud University signed an agreement that expands on exist­ing collaborations between the two institutions.

The agreement involved joint research and commercialization opportunities and an international exchange for faculty members and non-degree graduate students.

Suffice to say, the president was very busy in April, as he also made a trip to Brazil. He signed a new agreement with the University of São Paulo that will promote international collabora­tion in water research and education.

“We are pleased to expand on our existing relationship with the Uni­versity of São Paulo,” said Hamdul­lahpur. “Water-related research and education is a core strength of our two institutions. We look forward to expanding opportunities for our students and faculty while addressing real issues affecting water security in Brazil and Canada.”

The University of São Paulo is widely considered Latin America’s leading comprehensive univer­sity and has extensive research and teaching experience in water-related disciplines.